The Second Star

By Alma Alexander

The Parada had been lost for almost two hundred years before they recovered the ship, drifting in stygian interstellar darkness, and brought her home again.

But that was not the miracle.

The miracle was that the crew was still alive.

That was also the problem.
Six crew members went out on the Parada, Earth’s first starship. All contact was lost, and the ship vanished for almost two centuries. When the Parada’s successor found the drifting ship and somehow managed to bring it home, the six crew members were not only still alive but barely older, due to the time dilation effects of near-FTL travel. Their return was a miracle – but it could not be revealed to the waiting world. The problem was, six individuals went out to the stars. More than seventy fractured personalities came back.

Psychologist Stella Froud and Jesuit Father Philip Carter were recruited as part of the team assembled to investigate the mystery, and to try and help the Parada’s crew understand their condition and possibly reverse it. What they discovered was a deepening mystery, and very soon they found themselves forced to take sides in a conflict that nobody could have possibly predicted. Their world would never be the same again.

"Like its cast of returned starfarers, this rich and continually surprising novel is many things at once: a religiously-inflected first contact novel; an engaging psychological mystery; a glimpse of the future through the eyes of the past; and a moving tale about the difficulties of homecoming. I highly recommend it." - Matt Ruff, author of 'Set This House in Order' and 'Lovecraft Country'

• Language: English
• Publisher: Crossroad Press
• Release date: Jun 15, 2020
• ISBN: 9781951510459

Alma Alexander

Alma Alexander was born in Yugoslavia and has lived in Zambia, Swaziland, Wales, South Africa and New Zealand. She now lives in Washington state, USA. She writes full-time and runs a monthly creative writing workshop with her husband.

Book preview

THE SECOND STAR

By Alma Alexander

A Mystique Press Production

Mystique Press is an imprint of Crossroad Press

Digital Edition published by Crossroad Press

Smashwords edition published at Smashwords by Crossroad Press

Digital Edition Copyright © 2020 Alma Alexander

ISBN: ePub Digital Edition - 978-1-951510-45-9

ISBN: Trade Paperback - 978-1-951510-50-3

Partial cover courtesy of Nate Rayfield via Unsplash

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Meet the Author

Alma (A.D.) Alexander's life so far has prepared her very well for her chosen career. She was born in a country which no longer exists on the maps, has lived and worked in seven countries on four continents (and in cyberspace!), has climbed mountains, dived in coral reefs, flown small planes, swum with dolphins, touched two-thousand-year-old tiles in a gate out of Babylon. She is a novelist, anthologist and short story writer who currently shares her life between the Pacific Northwest of the USA (where she lives with her husband and two cats) and the wonderful fantasy worlds of her own imagination. You can find out more about Alma on her website (www.AlmaAlexander.org), her Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/AuthorAlmaAlexander/), on Twitter

(https://twitter.com/AlmaAlexander) or at her Patreon page (https://www.patreon.com/AlmaAlexander)

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Once I believed that space could have no power over faith, just as I believed that the Heavens declared the glory of God’s handiwork. Now I have seen that handiwork, and my faith is sorely troubled.

– Arthur C. Clarke, The Star

Table of Contents

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1.

The grim-faced man at the head of the conference table wore a uniform unfamiliar to Stella Froud; somehow that simple fact made him strangely threatening. As if to underline that impression, he swept an intense gaze around the table, catching and holding the eyes of each of the six people seated there for one long, powerful moment.

This meeting is classified, he said. You have all already signed documents which state that you will not speak of anything you see or hear in this room to anyone who is not presently in it. The penalties for failing to do so are severe and they will be enforced. Is that absolutely clear to everybody?

There were wordless nods. The uniformed man frowned.

I need verbal agreement. Do you understand?

He went around the table again. Everyone murmured their assent. They had been interested, before. Now some of them were alarmed. Stella, who had trained to observe the tiniest nuance of human reaction, could feel that wariness building behind the carefully schooled expressions of the five people sitting around the table with her. There were no grimaces or scowls—but their eyes had changed. Dr. Vivien Collins’s pupils had dilated in shock. She was the only pure academic in the room and probably not used to this kind of military atmosphere.

I am General Aristide Niarchos, the man in uniform said. "You are all here because our history has just collided with our future, and we hope that you—you in this room—will be able to find a path forward for us. Dr. Collins, would you please start us off with what is known about the Parada?"

Vivien Collins took a deep breath. Stella could see her hands clutching at the table in front of her in a white-knuckled grip.

There are lots of things I could tell you about that ship, she said. We have the specs right there— She flicked a wrist at the screen wall, and it displayed a dense schematic of the guts of a starship, completely meaningless to most of the rest of the people in that room. A further wrist flick started the screen shifting into close-ups of individual parts of the schematic, or scrolling tables full of incomprehensible numbers. Vivien glanced up at the screen with an almost distracted air, and then back at the rest of the group, and with a third flick of the wrist produced an image of a stocky ship floating against space in the orbital shipyard and froze the screen there. "But that’s the Parada," she said simply.

We’ve all seen pictures, muttered John Lumumba, the engineer. I’d know that ship…

Another woman at the table, sitting on the far end, as far from the screen wall as was possible in that room, sat forward, peering at the screen with a squint.

Wait, she said, hesitating, "that’s not right. The Gamma Wing of the shipyard wasn’t even built when the Parada was made. Is that a composite?"

Vivien swallowed. "No, you’re right. It wasn’t. Not when the original Parada was in the shipyard. But that… is the Parada. Up there. Right now."

The reaction ran down the table like a shiver.

It’s been almost a century since the last time anyone heard from that ship! Alicia Hernandez, the woman who had observed the incongruous Gamma Wing, said. "It’s been nearly two hundred years since it was launched! What do you mean, that’s the Parada? The ship? The actual ship? The real ship? How…?"

Where did you find it? John Lumumba interjected.

There was a small awkward pause and then the medic in the room, Dr. Ichiro Amari, cleared his throat. The crew? he asked softly.

He was most likely thinking about their physical wellbeing, the state they might have been in when they were found—or their extinction.

But Stella Froud suddenly knew why she was here. It had been something she had been puzzling over ever since she had got the summons and met the rest of the people in this room—all of them might have something to do with the physical mystery of the ghost ship that was the Parada, drifting home from the deep past. But only she, Stella Froud, pioneering Psychometric Counselor, dealt in the mind.

The crew was alive. Somehow, impossibly, the crew was still alive.

And apparently insane enough to require Stella’s ministrations.

Individual pieces of the Parada’s story were laid out in the boardroom as the day unraveled into evening. Stella understood very little of the math—which was presented in detail and which at least two of the people in that room knew enough about to literally gasp as the implications were revealed to them by the numbers—but the number that stopped her in her tracks and sent her deep down the rabbit hole of its potential implications was staggering. She broke the rules and sat up and demanded that the General repeat the last thing he had just said.

"In the two hundred years that the Parada has been out there, its crew has aged by less than three, General Niarchos said. Yes, you heard that right. Its drive was calibrated to run at 90 percent of light speed. For reasons unknown to us, it suddenly and somehow went much faster. It ran at closer to 99.99 percent. The tau factor increases by ten in the speed it hit, and the time dilation effects increase exponentially."

I don’t understand that, Stella said impatiently. It’s technobabble to me. Tell me in real terms.

"In real terms, at the specifications which the Parada was built for, in the time frame we are talking about, the crew would have aged just over twenty eight years for the two centuries that have passed for us back here. Which in itself feels hard enough to believe. But because their drive impossibly kicked into a higher gear, without their sanction or their knowledge, when we found them the crew had aged by less than three years. 2.8 years exactly, to be precise."

So have we found the fountain of youth? asked John Lumumba with heavy-handed levity.

Stella favored him with a quick scowl, and then turned back to the General. I can see why they might think I could be of use here, she said. That kind of Grand Canyon can be difficult to grasp or to adjust to. Some psychometric issues might well have arisen. But why do I get the feeling that there’s more to this than just a handful of disoriented star-farers trying to come to terms with their two lost centuries?

"Because there is more to it than that, the General said. The Parada had a crew of six. If we are to believe the evidence we have before us, well, six people went out. More than seventy returned."

Stella sat up. What?

Extreme stress seems to have fractured…

She finally got it, in a rush. They have multiple personalities? She paused. All of them?

The General gave a small, almost unwilling nod. "Some more than others. And then it gets complicated. Rob and Jerry Hillerman are twins. They share a couple of the personalities."

That’s… not possible, Stella said, frowning.

Alicia Hernandez snorted inelegantly. You’re buying that they aged less than three years in two centuries but you don’t accept that weird shit happened to their minds in the process?

I have some idea of what the human mind can do when it’s broken, Stella said. But…

And then you put that human mind into a thin metal shell and hurl it at the stars, Alicia said, interrupting. I think you can throw out the usual equations. I think we’re in uncharted territory. Here there be dragons. And some of them may be itching to eat us.

How do they… the multiple personalities… manifest? Stella persisted.

The General scowled again, and spoke in a low voice into the communicator on his wrist. Moments later, two people in uniform stepped smartly into the room and stood waiting just inside the door. The General tossed his head in their direction.

Lieutenant Marsh and Lieutenant Colonel—and Doctor—Peck, he said to Stella. I think you’d better go with them, I don’t think you’re even going to hear anything else that’s said in this room after this, and, well, given your own specialty, you probably have no need to.

Ichiro Amari rose and gave a small bow in the General’s direction. With your leave, this is more my area of expertise, as well, he said. I assume I am here to provide some sort of a medical opinion of the crew members. I may as well begin now.

And I’d better go with her, too said another voice, one which had not spoken before, and a man dressed in black, whose presence had been so unobtrusive that some of the people in the room only just realized that he had been there all the time, stood up. He was wearing a priest’s cassock, and his identity was immediately obvious. Doctor Froud, I am Father Philip Carter. And I think that the reason I am here is the same as the reason you are. The engineers have the problem of the ship’s malfunction. You and I and Doctor Amari, we are here to take care of the people.

The general nodded and the two military people led the way out of the conference room. Before the door had fully closed behind Philip Carter, Stella had already slipped into place beside the clean-shaven, dark-haired man who had been identified as Dr. Peck.

Sir—Doctor—what do I call you? she said, with a tinge of exasperation. Military hobbles in communication were never her thing.

Outside of the General’s presence, Martin will do, Martin Peck said. My fellow officer is Lydia Marsh. And what we can tell you is very little, really, and most of that is difficult to believe.

That’s probably why I am here, Stella said grimly. You’d be surprised at what I would believe.

What do you know about them? Martin asked.

What everyone does. They’re historical figures, they’ve been extensively written about—I’ve read that stuff. In the data banks. Online. If you’re asking if I was fan enough to read the biographies and the books and all the accumulated piles of stuff which it is increasingly tough to figure out whether it’s actually true or not, no, I haven’t. I know their names. I could probably tell you one or two things about them. But anything more than that… Stella shrugged. Frankly, I’m still trying to wrap my mind around the simple fact that I’m going to be face to face with them in a moment. I haven’t really gone beyond that yet.

You’ll know more about them than you ever wanted, Martin said. We have entire data banks on them. On what they were. On… on what they have become. Before you get to face them I suspect you’ll want to sit down and do some reading.

Ichiro stepped up to Martin’s other flank and fell into step. Excuse me, he said, but is there information in those folders on their actual physical wellbeing? I mean, were they examined…

Doctor, Martin said, "they were put through the wringer when we got them back. First they were kept under wraps up in the Parada, you know, just in case they came back carrying some extraterrestrial plague. For at least ten days. They passed their physicals just fine. In fact, they were healthier than we had any right to expect them to be. They read like they’d just stepped off the farm, having eaten healthy food straight from the good earth rather than all that synthetic junk they had to live on while they were out there."

But there were indications of a problem, up at the ship. We saw the first manifestations of the splintering up there, as the first medical tests were done. But we chalked it up to the situation—given what they had lived through, they were certainly permitted to be a little stir crazy. So we brought them down here, to see if being back on the actual dirtball of the home world would help, Lydia Marsh chimed in from behind. "We said nothing to the public, not yet, but their numbers were so good—at least their physical numbers—that we had every intention of releasing them out into the world, straight after their three weeks’ mandatory quarantine period had ended, and we thought we could deal with their… quirks… as necessary. We had no idea that anything was actually really wrong. And then… they began to manifest… or at the very least they began to let us see that there were more of them than we thought…" She grimaced.

You’d better get that from the transcripts, Martin said, interrupting. We don’t want to influence your own reading of the matter.

But do I at least get to see them? Stella persisted. I mean, before I get taken off to the library to do my homework?

Sure, Martin said. We have surveillance at all times in their habitat. CCTV, and more sophisticated 3D options if necessary. Them, and the other lot.

Habitat? Stella echoed, frowning. It had a distressing echo of a zoo.

The other lot? Ichiro asked, rousing.

Martin glanced at him. "The Juno crew. The ones who found them, who brought them back. After this lot went nuts, we thought we’d better hang onto the other three for a little while, just in case."

"You have two ships’ crews in lockup? Philip Carter said incredulously. What have you told their families?"

"Well, the good news is that the Parada crew don’t have any to speak of, Martin said. They themselves had no children—they all left before permanent relationships on Earth anchored them with progeny. Their parents and grandparents and great grandparents have come and gone. The Hillerman twins did us the favor of taking each other’s only sibling along for the ride—so that line ends right there. Two of the others had left siblings behind, and those have gone on to have descendants—but I don’t think they’re losing any sleep over the fate of their great great great uncles and aunts, not this long after they’d been presumed dead and gone."

What about the other crew? Philip asked.

"As for the Juno crew, Martin went on smoothly, one of the guys had a wife, and a small daughter. Well, he basically more or less released that woman from the relationship when he boarded the craft. The other two were unmarried, with a couple of living parents in the mix. We just haven’t told those people their kinsmen have returned yet, and won’t until we’re certain that we can."

That’s cold, Philip murmured.

Wait, have the second ship’s crew also… splintered? Stella interrupted.

Not as yet, Martin said. They’re under observation. He grimaced, giving her a side-eyed look. You’ll have folders on them, too.

I will want to examine them, Ichiro said, softly but insistently.

Of course, Martin said. That, after all, is why you are here. Our doctors have called in a second opinion.

Stella had thought she knew exactly where the meeting had been held—in the headquarters of World Government, the glass-and steel tower overlooking the Strait of Bosphorus, wider these days, from the sea rise, than it had been in the day when it had received that name, on the European side of the channel. But after they descended by a secure elevator down to a subterranean level, and passed beyond a set of solid doors on the strength of several levels of sophisticated facial recognition ID, Stella realized that she was in no place that she had ever known existed. Corridors were chopped into short passages each divided from the next by sealed security gates requiring biometric clearance before they would provide grudging admittance; by the time they had passed three of those, and zigged and zagged their way in the bowels of this secret edifice, Stella was hopelessly lost.

Martin caught her glancing backward at one of the gates closing inexorably behind the small group, and managed a small smile.

You have clearance, he said. It isn’t a prison. You’ll have to lodge a scan and a set of prints but you have access, both ways. I mean, within reason.

"It isn’t a prison for me," Stella murmured.

Nor for them. God knows we don’t want to lock them away like animals in a menagerie. That’s why you’re here, Doctor. To try and free them.

I have a feeling none of us are all that free to come and go either, Philip remarked. After all yon General upstairs has impressed upon us all that we are not to speak of any of this to anybody anywhere ever at all—so where would we be allowed to go, exactly…?

Let us first see what there is to see, without jumping to any conclusions, Ichiro said, lifting his hands in a gesture of peacemaking. "Just where do you have these poor people buried, though?"

Right here, Martin said, taking an abrupt turn and opening yet another door with a thumb pressed into a scan reader. This would be your first stop. This is the Surveillance Room.

He walked into the room, followed by Stella, Philip and Ichiro in single file, with Lydia bringing up the rear. Three of the four walls of the room were covered with multiple screens showing various rooms and common areas. The three team members instinctively sought the time travelers, the crew which had so improbably returned from the deep past, but Martin steered them first towards the left-hand wall. The operator sitting at a computer workstation before the screen wall obligingly moved aside as the group approached.

The simplest first, Martin said. "These are the Juno people. The man in the first set of screens, top row, that’s the captain—Hugh de Mornay. Next row down, First Officer Tyrone Kidman. Third row, Second Officer and Ship’s Medical Officer Joseph White Elk. As you can see, they’re perfectly nice normal people."

For now, Lydia muttered.

Stella shot her a look but forbore to comment. She and Ichiro both leaned forward for a closer look, scanning the screens. Each row had three separate screens covering three separate areas—a sleeping cubicle, with a private workstation, and an angle of the shared central common atrium into which individual private quarters gave out, with the relevant camera in each row covering as much of the common area as possible in its range while including the doorway into each man’s private quarters. There were six of those leading off the common area, but only three were occupied here; currently, Tyrone Kidman appeared to be asleep on his bunk. Hugh de Mornay and Joseph White Elk sat opposite one another in the common atrium looking equally bored while sitting hunched over a game of backgammon, a striking contrast of a Viking-blond muscular man and a slight, almost effeminate, bronze-skinned Native American with a long black braid lying on his narrow back.

You spy on them in their private quarters? Stella said, taken aback, staring at Tyrone’s sleeping form. Isn’t that… I don’t know… in violation of something? It feels intrusive—they aren’t lab rats…

When there may be a danger of them doing harm to themselves, privacy isn’t an option, Lydia Marsh said.

Stella whipped her head around, her eyes wide. "Somebody tried to commit suicide? Which one?"

Not those three, Martin said. "However, it’s only Joe—that’s Joe White Elk—who doesn’t seem to care where he is. The other Juno two are getting antsy. They haven’t been here all that long, yet, and they’ve been assured they aren’t prisoners—but they’re well past believing that."

"Didn’t you tell them why you’re holding them?" Stella said, more astonished by the minute.

Well… in the beginning they accepted the quarantine, Martin said. "Then we had our hands full with the other lot. And after a little while going back to the Juno crew and telling them that they’re under observation to find out if they’re going to go nuts or not… seemed like it would push them into going nuts, if you see what I mean."

Stella straightened, and looked Martin straight in the eye. Well, for one, we’re going to start telling everyone the truth, she snapped. I can understand that you don’t want word of this spreading prematurely into the general populace but for Heaven’s sake these people are directly involved. I can’t be lying to people I am trying to help. If these need any help. They are apparently behaving exactly as any normal human beings should. Just how long have you had them in there?

Just over two weeks, now, Martin said. We thought we could stretch the quarantine story for at least a month.

That ends, Stella said sharply.

I’d read their files first, Lydia said, all military in the moment. "I mean, we have no idea when, exactly, the others… went crazy… or how long that took. We just know when we noticed it. What if we let these three go and they implode out there where anyone can see it? They’re going to be public figures when they emerge—the world knows their names—they can’t just go into quiet anonymity. If they go crazy they do that in the full glare of the world media. That isn’t going to be very good for any…"

Would you please stop saying ‘crazy’? Stella said. We aren’t in the Middle Ages, burning people for being witches if they say they hear voices. DPD has been known for quite a long time now, and…

DPD? Philip asked, frowning.

Dissociative Personality Disorder, Stella said. "I could give you guys folders to read on that, if you are interested. Its history and its symptoms and its cures, or lack thereof. Still, it isn’t ‘crazy’. Not in the way you are implying."

Yeah? Lydia said, goaded out of her stiff military persona just for a moment, and responding with some heat. So this lot look perfectly normal, and they have been, so far. Now take a look at some of the other screens.

They stepped over to the middle wall, with a similar arrangement of screens in three rows. It was Ichiro who identified the people covered by each row.

That’s Rob and Jerry Hillerman, he said softly, and if I am not mistaken, Captain Han Millgar.

The entities who used to answer to those names, anyway, Martin said. He peered into the screens. "Actually, the twins are themselves right now, I think. Han…what is he doing? Is he Raff again?"

Raff? Stella said, leaning in to pay closer attention to Captain Han Millgar’s screen row. In the last of the three screens, in the common area, the captain was engaged in building an elaborate construction of emery sticks and playing cards. His hands moved very delicately, as though he was operating a completely different body than the one she could see on the screen; Stella found herself fascinated by his movements which, even though she had never seen the real Captain Millgar, she instinctively knew had never belonged to that man as he used to be.

Again, it’s all in the files, Martin said. That’s why I wanted you to read those first. Raff is one of Captain Millgar’s splinter personalities—one of ten that we know of right now, but we don’t know if these people are through splitting off yet or if it’s an ongoing process. They didn’t all manifest to us at once, after all; we picked up individual fragments one at a time, really. That one—Raff—maintains he’s thirteen, and has never let a thought stand between him and something he wants to do. He fancies himself as something of a budding scientist and we had to take an inventory of anything in that area which he could use to ‘do experiments’ with. We can barely allow him toothpaste.

The house of cards trembled at a careless movement, and as they watched the whole thing collapsed in a heap. Captain Millgar’s face twisted, and Stella could clearly see a change in his features, in his eyes, in the angle at which his wrists suddenly held his hands, as he looked up for a moment and gave the camera a direct and venomous stare.

Martin noticed her noticing, and nodded. Yup. That’s Cap. Han’s ‘evil twin’.

He has a twin too? Ichiro inquired softly.

No. Not a physical one, not like the Hillermans. Cap… is the ‘bad’ part of himself.

Martin called the Cap personality Han’s Devil’s advocate, Lydia said.

Martin shrugged. Or perhaps his Devil. I am not sure. It’s hard to be sure of anything when it comes to these people.

You said the twins were ‘being themselves’—what did you mean? Stella asked, transferring her attention to the other two screen rows and the two apparently identical men they showed, both, at this moment, reading quietly inside their own quarters, sitting on their beds in cross-legged positions that mirrored one another exactly.

They like to read, Martin said. "They always did, according to their profiles. That said, though, they are going through books at an astonishing rate. We are supplying them with real physical books, which they seem to prefer, as well as eBooks on their digital readers—and I can tell you, both have had their problems—paper books are bulky and sometimes unavailable, and as for the digital ones, it’s been two hundred years since they’ve last played around with that kind of thing. The formats have changed, and so has the hardware—we supplied the current tech but they prefer the stuff they’re familiar with… if we can provide compatible material for it. They’re plowing through what we do give them at an uncanny speed. Anything—they’ll read a work of fiction, and it doesn’t matter if it’s recent or something from back in their time, and something on all the history they missed out on in the past two centuries, and a textbook on the latest developments in quantum physics, and they won’t bat an eyelid about any of it. They’re sucking it all in, as though they’re trying to catch up with two hundred years of the world in a handful of weeks. And what’s more, the way they retain what they read is weird—different personalities seem to remember different books. It can be most disconcerting."

And you’ve been dealing with this… yourself?

Myself and a small medical team, Martin said. Including a psychiatrist. But he’s been a little out of his depth.

And all sworn to secrecy. Nobody able to ask questions of anyone outside this building. No expert help?

Well, it all looked manageable, initially, until it blew up in our faces, Martin said defensively. "And anyway, we called in the cavalry. That’s why you’re here."

Stella’s teeth clicked together. And the rest of them?

The third and final wall showed three more of the Parada crew, and again it was Ichiro who named them.

Alaya McGinty… Lily Mae Washington… Bogdan Dimitrov, he said.

Correct, but not accurate, Martin said, peering at the screens. He pointed to the rows in turn. Hard to tell from out here, precisely, but I think Alaya might currently be Joan—that’s the personality, with her, that gravitates towards research, and look at her, concentrating over that reader—there’s a set to those shoulders that we’ve learned isn’t strictly Alaya’s—and Lily Mae, from the way she’s slitting her eyes, might be channeling Diana, which is why Boz is looking very much like he’s being Boris, and if I’m right we’re probably going to have to send an orderly in there to stop them from getting physical with each other.

Philip was getting lost in the names. Boz? he asked plaintively. And Boris is…?

Boz is what Bogdan is known as, by the rest of the crew. It’s a sort of shorthand nickname. He answers to that, still. And Boris—that’s one of the fragments. He’s the backstreet thuglet, and apparently always spoiling for a fight, Martin said. Unfortunately, when Lily Mae goes full ‘street’, which is what Diana is, that brings out Boris real fast. And it got bloody at least once.

But why don’t you separate them? Ichiro asked, appalled.

"Because, Doctor, when they aren’t being Boris and Diana they are actually rather attached to each other. We tried separating them. One of Boz’s personalities threatened suicide."

Personalities? Or the individual…?

Good question—but either way, the act would harm the physical body they share, so it’s moot. We didn’t want to have these people survive a trip out to the stars and then end up drinking bleach back here on Earth.

It wouldn’t be a good look for you, no, Philip murmured, his eyes downcast.

Martin drew his eyebrows together into a frown, but Stella wasn’t even paying attention to the last exchange. She seemed unable to tear her eyes from the screens where, indeed, a pair of orderlies had just stepped inside and separated the crew members who used to go by the name of Bogdan Dimitrov and Lily Mae Washington, herding each into their own private area to cool off by themselves. Lily Mae’s personality… Diana?… wasn’t taking it quietly. Stella saw the orderly grimace as he was kicked in the shin. A third orderly had slipped into the common area, keeping an eye on Han, who was still wearing the expression of Cap the Evil Twin but who was watching the separation of the two combatants without attempting to interfere.

I think you’re right, Stella said faintly. I think I need to sit down and swot up on this before I wade in there with hob nailed boots.

This way, Martin said. We have a library.

When can I interview the crews—both the crews? Stella asked as they stepped back into the corridor and Martin led the way to the library. I mean, once I’ve had a chance to catch up with everything you’ve found out so far…

I, too, would like that opportunity, Philip said quietly

When you come to a point where you have decided how you want to set up these interviews, we will make the necessary schedules, Martin said. I suspect it will take you at least a little time. Give yourself a couple of days. He grimaced. "At least."

Stella touched the purse she carried cross-body style, the bag lying just above her left hip. My phone, she said. I haven’t been able to access service since I’ve been in this building—and I need to make arrangements…

Your luggage has already been transferred to your quarters from your hotel, Martin said. Close proximity to your subjects for the duration of your research seemed to be indicated. The same applies to you, Dr. Amari, Father Carter.

My practice… began Ichiro, frowning a little.

Your employers and your patients have been informed that you have been seconded to Government service, Martin said.

We’re in quarantine, too? Philip asked, with a small smile that showed rather a lot of teeth. I mean, I know you made us sign NDAs but this feels rather more substantial than that…

But… I have a cat, Stella said stupidly. "I only made arrangements to come here for a couple of days. I don’t have that much luggage, I just packed for a week. And I have a cat. I need to…"

We are aware, Martin said quietly. All the arrangements are in place. He pulled out a clear device and tapped on it; the transparent screen morphed into several windows of rapidly updating data streams and studied it for a moment as he walked. We have all the details on file, he said. Down to your cat’s favorite canned food. All the commitments of your personal and professional lives will be taken care of while you are here, and there is going to be someone available 24/7 to cover your needs while you are here.

Stella looked a little spooked at being told that Smokey the cat’s preferences in the realm of cat food were on file in a government dossier, but Philip, passing over the cat issue, nodded at the phone in Martin’s hand.

Your device works, Philip commented.

There is a protected network, Martin murmured. I am afraid that for now your own outside communication is going to be limited—it’s all in the NDAs. Copies of those will be in the comm units you’ll be getting. In here, he added, indicating a door to his left. The library.

They entered a utilitarian room, bright white, with stark black metal shelving holding a number of books and folders against the far wall and four computer work-stations arranged at individual desks, with individual adjustable glows set above them. Bright overhead lights recessed in the drop ceiling flooded the rest of the place with almost painful glare; one of them had the faintest of flickers, twitching at the corner of Stella’s eye, and she knew that she would have a splitting headache if she had to stay in here for too long. She grimaced up at the offending light.

That… she said, glowering at it for a moment.

Martin made a note into his tablet. Maintenance will replace the light immediately, he said, making Stella give him a sharp glance. The pendulum swing between ‘virtually incommunicado and held here at our pleasure’ and ‘we will take immediate action to correct a barely voiced complaint’ was dizzying. Let me just give you the quick rundown of the facilities. The hard copy materials on the shelves over there may not seem too plentiful, but those are possibly the most relevant records in physical form—at least some of us, and I plead guilty to that, are still enough of an anachronism to find that actually seeing something in hard copy does help in understanding it. The rest is on the servers, there. He nodded at the computers. You may use both or either at your will. There are just a few formalities that need to be done—the computers are voice activated—would you please wake a monitor, and just say your name?

Philip was the first to move, taking the few steps towards the nearest station and sitting down in front of it. The thin, transparent, rectangular screen that served as a monitor irised into a light blue background with a red eye on it.

Identification required, it said, in a melodious female voice. Voice print initiated.

Philip Carter, Philip said steadily.

The eye blinked, rotated, and the screen turned green. The smooth gray plastic surface of the desk directly in front of Philip transformed into a keyboard and a set of lighted touch-sensitive controls.

Voice print accepted, the computer said. Welcome, Philip Carter.

The controls on the side will give you privacy or soundproofing of your workspace if you need it. Individual databases can be accessed directly. Please feel free to familiarize yourself with the station. In the meantime—Dr. Amari, Dr. Froud, would you do the like? Martin asked, indicating unoccupied stations. And while we’re about this, we might as well get the rest over with. Father Carter, would you look this way please? Look straight ahead and don’t blink for a moment, if you don’t mind…

He held the phone in Philip’s line of sight, and a pale green light scrolled across Philip’s eye.

That’s the scan on record. Would you please press your thumb on the screen…? When Philip obliged, Martin tapped a few characters on the screen, and then repeated the procedure with the other two after they had finished their voice print procedures. That should get you anywhere you need to go that you have clearance to enter, Martin said. That includes the crew quarters for the subjects, when the time comes. All right…

"Subjects makes them sound like guinea pigs," Stella said faintly.

I beg your pardon?

You’re a doctor. They’re people. You might call them patients, except that even that isn’t right…

One has to call them something, as a group, Martin said. I know. But this isn’t your average waiting room. Their backgrounds, their charts, everything we know so far—that’s all either in those folders on the shelves, or on those computers. The computers are data banks; they are not connected to the Net or in any way equipped for outside communications. You may search the data banks for any information contained there, or you may make a request for any information that you require. That request will be received and processed, and the requested material will be made available to you but you will not be able to directly access any other data banks from here. This is a self-contained unit—and yes, in a way, it’s all under quarantine. Until such time as we can make a decision on what—or if it comes to that, who—will be released into the world, and the media. For now, it all stays in this building.

For how long? Ichiro asked quietly. Does that pertain to us as well? Our own lives…

"You are all here to help us investigate the Parada’s return," Martin said.

How long is that going to take? Philip asked, leaning his chin on the arm he had draped across the back of his chair.

As long as it takes, Martin said. "It isn’t just you. All of us in here are in lockdown together with that crew, until we can figure out what happened. I don’t need to tell you that humanity’s future out there in the galaxy depends on what we find out. On whether the Parada was an aberration, on whether the Juno crew fall apart too, on whether we can do anything at all to put the pieces back together or if we’re faced with something that there’s no coming back from."

DPD has only really been diagnosed—as a syndrome—very late in the 20th century, Stella said. "Before that, it was just sectionable insanity, and nothing for it but asylums or questionable medical procedures which probably did nothing at all for the syndrome and only physically crippled the patients. But even in the years since it’s been identified, and studied, we only know more about what it actually is, how it works—not much about how to cure it. And that’s just talking about the classic syndrome, the kind that rears up in the wake of a personal childhood trauma of some sort which initiates the splintering off of personalities which exist to deal with a specific issue. This… I have never heard of anything like this. If you’re hoping for an actual cure, I don’t know if you’re going to be very happy with the outcome of anything that I or somebody like me can bring to the situation. And if you’re waiting for a cure to happen, none of us might ever leave this building."

I have done some research into the matter, Martin said grimly, and I am aware that there is no magic bullet. But there have been reintegration studies. There has been some success in particular cases…

It’s not a body of evidence, Stella said. It’s case by case, and here you have six, and maybe possibly nine, fairly severe cases, from what I’ve learned so far. The first question I have to ask is, do you have any idea what actually triggered any of this?

Some of the personalities have given us theories, Martin said. You be the judge of how much weight we can put on any of that. If you feel the need to discuss issues directly with people who have interacted with the crew so far that can be arranged. Starting with myself—you will find a list of relevant people in the data bank—but video, holos, and transcripts of every conversation we have had with every single one of the subjects…

Stella winced, and Martin grimaced, but went on. All that material is available to you directly. All any of us will be able to tell you is second-hand data seen through our own very human filters and possible prejudices. Like me calling them subjects.

It was somewhat black humor, but Stella gave him a ghost of a smile. Wisely, Martin didn’t pursue the matter.

Can I start now? Stella asked, turning to glance at the waiting monitor.

Certainly, Martin said, if you would like. If you need anything—just tell the computer. Someone is always on duty.

You spoke of quarters being assigned, Philip said quietly. If I may, I would prefer to retreat to mine, for now. I have no direct research I feel I need to follow up on immediately but I would very much appreciate an opportunity to reflect on the matter in a quiet place. My answers might lie elsewhere entirely.

Of course. I will escort you there myself. Martin turned to the other two. It is getting rather late, he said, if you would prefer to sleep on it before starting fresh tomorrow? There will be a communication device—a replacement phone if you like—for each of you in your quarters, with relevant information already programmed in—I might just add that breakfast opens at oh-seven-hundred, and is served for three hours, but there is hot food available at the cafeteria at any time. Information on how to find the Caf is going to be on your comm units.

I’ll stay here, Stella said. I couldn’t sleep anyway.

Dr. Amari?

Myself also, Ichiro said. I feel likewise very awake right now.

Martin nodded. When you are ready, call, he said, Father, if you will follow me…

Philip said nothing more to the other two, rising from his chair and following Martin out of the room.

Stella and Ichiro met each other’s eyes and sat for a long moment in absolute silence. Then Stella sighed, looking away towards the computer monitor.

I feel a little kidnapped, she said softly.

Assuredly, Ichiro murmured. Particularly since they seem to have competent medical personnel already in place, at least when it comes to physical health. I am not sure what precisely my role here is.

You are probably needed as someone who will look at impossible data and verify that it is in fact true, if not precisely easily explained, Stella said with a small smile. You’re here because you are non-military—a civilian authority. Someone they can point to when awkward questions are asked that they may not want to answer themselves.

A possible scapegoat? Ichiro asked, raising an eyebrow.

Anything goes, Stella said, feeling a wild urge to giggle. There’s only one thing I know, going forward—and that is that I know nothing. Yet, anyway. Will you excuse me? I think I’ll go rummage around in the data banks they seem so proud of and see what I can come up with…

Ichiro gave her a small bow. I will look at the medical records, he said. It is a place to start.

They had been household names, the crew of the Parada, when the ship set out to the stars—specifically, to explore exoplanets discovered during the early 21st century probes launched into the Alpha Centauri and Proxima Centauri systems. Six heroes who stepped on board humanity’s first starship, purely on faith. The world had waved them goodbye with tears of pride and had held its collective breath as the rendezvous rocket took what the media had branded the Six to the Stars up into the shipyard in Earth orbit where their craft waited for them—the Parada, new-built, shining with promise, with dreams, with hope.

Captain Hanford Millgar, First Officer Jerry Hillerman, Navigator Rob Hillerman, Engineer Bogdan Dimitrov, Ship’s Medic Alaya McGinty, Science Officer and Astronomer Lily Mae Washington.

Their faces were on every screen, in every home. Children were taken out of school to watch the launch of the rendezvous rocket, and then again when the cameras in orbit showed the Parada slowly easing out of dock, hanging there as though posing for her close-up against the backdrop of space glittering with stars, and then turning away from the home planet, nose pointed into the dark. The people of Earth watched her begin moving away, getting smaller and smaller until she vanished from sight.

For a little while, the media kept up with the ship, passing on such telemetry data as was received back. There were even occasional messages from the Six to the Stars sent while the ship still tiptoed her way through the Solar System, passing Mars, sending images of Saturn that became as iconic as that first photograph of Earth hanging in the black skies of the Moon had been back in the days of the Moon shots, because those were literally the first images of a distant planet which had been taken